Rethink The Dress Code

Our Towns

Newington

September 23, 2005

Not that it's a bad idea for student athletes to dress up specially for classes on game days, but administrators at Newington High School took the wrong tack when they imposed a dress code as a method of instilling leadership and respect among the players.

For the time being, the dress requirement has had the opposite result for some students and their parents.

Under rules devised by Principal William Collins and the athletic department, all male athletes must wear shirts and ties and female athletes must wear skirts and blouses. Students and many parents (some of whom raised concerns about the added expense of the required clothing) were upset. They took their grievance to the school board last week, although officials say it falls outside the panel's purview.

Wearing special clothing to build team spirit on game days is a tradition at many schools and, until this year, football players in Newington wore their jerseys on game days.

So, school officials were not entirely off the mark in wanting the high school teams to have a game day look. Their mistake may have been failing to engage the athletes in a discussion of the topic.

Had the administrators brought in the team captains to a meeting, the students might have endorsed a game day dress code of coats and ties, or one at least acceptable to school officials. Drawing the athletes into a decision on a dress code would have created a core of support for putting it into effect.

By seeking the advice of the people most affected by the rule, administrators would have established a sense of camaraderie among all involved that would be evident during classes and then carried onto the field of play.

School officials missed a golden opportunity by simply imposing the rule and should have consulted with the players before arriving at their decision.